The Marine Data Center (MDC) at FSU has a long standing policy to ensure free and open access to underway marine meteorological observations. For SAMOS, the policy ensures that all data provided to FSU will be redistributed to the user community and national archive centers without any restrictions or "holds". If a vessel recruited to SAMOS is operating in restricted waters without clearance (e.g., in an exclusive economic zone) or is conducting classified work (e.g., Navy operations, marine archeology), the SAMOS data center requires the vessel operator not to submit data to SAMOS during these operations. The SAMOS data center has no capability to restrict access to any datasets. Data providers are requested to notify the SAMOS data center in writing (samos@coaps.fsu.edu) if they have any concerns with this free and open data policy.

At present, all users of the SAMOS data distributed on this site are anonymous. In the future, the data center reserves the right to implement a login system for data access. This system will be designed in a manner that will not violate our free and open policy (all users will be allowed to register). The only reason for implementing a login system would be to better track the number and type of data users. This user information will be helpful as we seek funding to support the SAMOS data center.